The $25,000 gym membership

Is this club’s ‘velvet rope’ treatment worth the dough?

January is when gyms make all sorts of offers aimed at those who are newly committed to getting lean and mean. E at Equinox, however, has no such deal: Instead, this super-high-end gym is all about exclusivity — and the jaw-dropping price tag that goes along with it. For $25,000 a year, members of the clubs — there are locations in New York City and Greenwich, Conn. — enjoy all sorts of plush amenities, from “freshly laundered E workout attire” to “private showers and changing cabanas,” the club literature touts. Members also have their own very private entrance, replete with a retinal scanner to identify them when they arrive. (In other words, no more crowded locker rooms and no carrying around that membership card.)

But just as important, says Equinox vice president David Harris, the E annual membership comes with an extensive fitness evaluation and two training sessions a week with a “Tier 4” personal coach. (Equinox says Tier 4 is the gym’s most elite training program — an exercise “prescription” that takes into consideration body composition, metabolic rate, gait and ability to move.) Of course, the club offers all the usual equipment, from treadmills to free weights, but Harris says the focus is less on what’s there and more on what you do with it under a trainer’s careful supervision. And that applies regardless of whether you’re a beginner or a pro. “We take the view that everyone is an athlete,” Harris says. The program will also consult with a client’s doctors for additional medical input.

The reality

Getting in shape doesn’t have to equate to a five-figure annual proposition, fitness experts say. It’s all about moving and making smart (and safe) use of equipment. “Fitness is a basic concept,” says Michael Rattenni, chairman of Triumph Group Management, which provides management services to more than 100 health clubs across the country. Most pros agree that proper evaluation and a well-conceived training regimen are the keys to success, but these can be had at a much more affordable price. Memberships at fairly deluxe clubs — ones with “full staffing, full service and comprehensive facilities,” as Jarred Fajerski, executive director of the hospital-affiliated Lifebridge Health & Fitness program in Baltimore, defines them — shouldn’t run more than $2,000 a year, with occasional training going for up to $100 a session. (You can also find clubs and trainers well below that mark, but Fajerski warns that you may “get what you pay for.”)

To some extent, the cost issue is not disputed by the Equinox chain, which has more than 60 traditional clubs throughout the United States, with membership prices that begin at around $1,800 annually and training that starts at $100 per session. (Tier 4 training, which is offered at some standard Equinox clubs, costs at least $160 a session.) As for what makes the E experience worth the extra dough, Harris says it is about privacy and a concierge-style degree of attentiveness that takes going to the gym to a whole other level. It’s “a velvet rope experience,” he says.

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